GSIAS English VI (Tuesday)
2016.11.08 & 15
We continued plowing through Dissertation Writing in Practice (DWIP)during these two class sessions, as well as doing exercises and working on our 8- to 10-page papers, to be presented Nov. 29th.
For next week, please read Chapters 4 and 5 in DWIP. A pair of students will present Chapter 4 to the class, and the entire class will go over Chapter 5 together. Also, please complete Follow-up Task #1 on page 125, which asks you to write an abstract. Please write your abstract about the paper you'll be presenting in this class Nov. 29th.
See you in class!
JBH
2016.11.01
In class today, we discussed examples of Literature Reviews from a few papers, completing Follow-up Task 3 on page 36. We also talked about our paper topics and how to refine them before moving on to Making Use of Source Materials in Chapter 2.
For next week, two students will guide the class through the remainder of Chapter 2. We will complete the Chapter Tasks in class. Please remember to also complete Follow-up Task 1 in Chapter 3 (on page 67) before class time. We will be talking about it in class.
And as we go through the book, please don't forget that your paper, approximately 10 pages including the features we are talking about in class, is due to be presented to your classmates on Nov. 29th.
See you in class!
JBH
2016.10.25
Back on track after exam week, we got started in earnest with Dissertation Writing in Practice.
Now we also need to be thinking about our paper project. Please decide on a topic related to your interests and studies that will be worthwhile working on for the rest of the semester. It should not be something you have already developed. We will use DWIP to help write a paper of approximately 10 pages before we finish this class.
2016.10.04
We continued working with How to Not Write Bad this week, finally wrapping up with the most difficult part for non-native English writers, dealing with clichés, euphemisms, and ambiguity.
Then we moved on to explore our summarizing assignment (Stage 3) further. Please complete the 200-word summary of How to Say Nothing in 500 Words for our next class session Oct. 11th. Also, please pre-read and be ready to discuss the introduction and first chapter of Dissertation Writing in Practice for our next session.
We will be going over the elements of a good dissertation, including the research question, and going on to write our Annotated Bibliographies (Stage 4) for week 8 (Oct. 18th).
Don't forget our Word, Quote, and Joke of the Day too.
See you in class!
JBH
2016.09.27
Our Tuesday class session was a regular one, starting with the Word, Quote, and Joke of the Day.
We followed that up by wrapping up our APA citing and referencing exercises, for a demonstration of how to put things together manually, and trying to figure out which standard to use for a pattern.
Then we moved on to look at a much simpler way, Zotero, that takes care of a lot of the basics, but still needs the user to understand the basics so he or she can correct problems with the program. Even computers can't always get APA style right, but we need to make our research citations and references as correct and consistent as possible.
We then continued going over the main points of How to Not Wite Bad, and have only one section left to look over next week.
For next week please look over all parts of complete the summarizing assignment at this link (Part 3).
We are almost ready to begin begin working with Dissertation Writing in Practice. We will work on developing our research question and an Annotated Bibliography assignment for an assignment due in two weeks as we start looking at a real research project.
See you in class,
JBH
2016.09.20
We continued developing our skills at referencing and citing sources using APA style, as well as looking over some pointers on writing.
When we meet in class 9-27, please have your APA exercises completed, be ready with a Word, Quote, and Joke of the Day, and to listen to students continue sharing tips from from How to Not Write Bad. In addition, please remember to bring your four articles from each category (see week 1) and be ready to discuss them and talk about how to build an annotated bibliography with your sources.
We should be moving into Dissertation Writing in Practice soon and begin working on our own writing as well.
See you in class!
JBH
2016.09.06
Sorry class, I had a few problems getting hold of the material I promised to post this week. We will work on it together in class. Please come to class Tuesday (9-13) prepared to look over each students' four articles for use in a class exercise. We will also continue with How to Not Write Bad. We will talk about all these items in class, including the Bib exercise I will bring, and hopefully be ready soon to shift to Dissertation Writing in Practice.
See you in class!
JBH
2016.08.30
This is going to be a writing-based class.
For next week,
-Start at 12:15 with Word, Quote, and Joke
-Assigned students will go over the highlights of How to Not Write Bad through page 24.
-Students will work together but are responsible for bringing in one research source from each of four areas:
- Scholarly books and journals
- Government/Internat’l Organization/NGO publications & documents
- Interviews and speeches (video recording and transcript is best)
- Magazines, newspapers, books (popular/less scholarly but still worth using)
Please bring a paper copy of your four resources to class next week and be ready to explain their meaning and usefulness to the class. We are looking for sources that are useful, interesting, and that we can learn from as we work together to build annotated bibliographies, summaries, citations, and figure out how to use them in our research.
Also, get hold of a copy of Dissertation Writing in Practice: Turning Ideas into Text by Linda Cooley and Jo Lemkowicz (Hong Kong University Press). We will be using both texts. Another excellent text you may want to make use of is Common Problems in Korean English by David Kosofsky. It is not a required text, but it useful, especially for Korean students, to avoid errors when speaking and writing in English.
I despise “busy work.” But it is not useful to bring in a resource for this exercise that you have already analyzed and written about for another assignment. Please use something new for you and for your classmates to explore.
See you in class!
JBH
